1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to an fisherman's tackle box. More specifically, my invention concerns a bucket sized fisherman's tackle box particularly for ice fishing such that the fisherman's tackle box is adapted for complete containment inside a standard five gallon bucket being seated on the circular planar closed bottom portion of the standard five gallon bucket. In this way, bait, food, poles, gaff and tip-ups to be placed in the bucket at the same time as the fisherman's tackle box enabling simultaneous transportation of the fisherman's tackle box and the bucket and its contents as one unit.
2. Description of the Prior Art
It is well known in the field of recreational fishing that ice fishermen commonly use a standard bucket, and often a five gallon plastic-type bucket, with which to carry their ice fishing gear to their ice fishing hole from their home and vice versa. The typical gear of an ice fisherman generally includes a tackle box, artificial bait and lures, poles, gaff and tip-ups. The typical tackle box comprises a square-type box having an operable top and a closed bottom. A tackle box of this type does not fit neatly inside a five gallon bucket which is cylindrical in shape. Further, having only a single opening top makes accessing the contents of the typical tackle box inconvenient at best and near impossible in other situations.
In an attempt to deal with this problem, prior art patents have utilized a five gallon bucket in conjunction with a tackle box by designing a tackle box that sits on the top rim portion of the five gallon bucket or is suspended from the top rim portion. These invention fail to securely contain the contents of the tackle box during transportation of the bucket and tackle box while at the same time enabling separation of the tackle box from the bucket to independently utilize the tackle box as desired. Further, prior art devices limit access to the internal contents of the bucket to only a top portion. My invention allows the user to gain access to the tackle box contents from either a top or bottom location, as desired, and further allows the user to only have to access one half of the top or bottom contents as desired. To the best of the inventor's knowledge, there does not exist a cylindrical-type tackle box that is designed for complete containment inside a standard bucket resting on the bottom portion of the bucket, thereby enabling simultaneous transportation of the bucket sized fisherman's tackle box, bait, poles, gaff and tip-ups all together inside the standard bucket at one time as a unit. It is true that a square tackle box with a diagonal length no larger than the diameter of a bucket would fit completely inside a standard bucket, resting on the bottom portion of the bucket, if desired. However, such a tackle box would waste much potential storage space inside the tackle box. For this reason, as well as others, in order to utilize a square tackle box having the same storage capacity as my disclosed and claimed bucket sized fisherman's tackle box, one has to use a square tackle box too large to fit inside a standard bucket. Thus, the user must carry the tackle box in a second hand. Having to carry the square tackle box in the other hand is inconvenient and often difficult when one has many things to carry to their ice fishing hole.
The unique features of my invention that differ significantly from any of those in the prior art specifically concern the mathematically configured and proportioned internal compartments and sub-compartments of my bucket sized fisherman's tackle box that maximize the available storage space in a bucket sized fisherman's tackle box. Stated differently, the compartments and sub-compartments have been configured to best accommodate an ice fisherman's artificial bait and tackle gear in a single tackle box unit easily accessible from either the top or the bottom. Further, the mathematically configured and proportioned compartment and sub-compartments are arranged such that if the tackle box were to be folded in half along a line A--A, the compartments or sub-compartments on one side of the line A--A would be a mirror image of the compartments or sub-compartments an opposite side of the line A--A. In this way, the compartment and sub-compartments are arranged to maximize the cylindrical area available to respective upper and lower level compartment and sub-compartments.
These and other types of tackle boxes disclosed in the prior art do not offer the flexibility and inventive features of my Bucket Sized Fisherman's Tackle Box. As will be described in greater detail hereinafter, the Bucket Sized Fisherman's Tackle Box of the present invention differs from those previously proposed.